Hurry Home
by Yoko Black
Summary: Set before, during, & after “Pilot”. John wants Sam to come back after Sam leaves for Stanford. Song: Hurry Home, by Jason Michael Carroll.


**Title: Hurry Home**

**Rating: T**

**Summery: Set before, during, & after "Pilot". John wants Sam to come back after Sam leaves for Stanford. Song: **_**Hurry Home**_**, by Jason Michael Carroll.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own show, characters or song. I don't make money off of this story. **

**Hurry Home**

_**He's been sitting by the phone since she left. But it's time for work and he just can't be late. So he grabs his old guitar and he plays a couple bars on the machine and then he sings…..**_

"What do you think you're doing," asked John walking into the motel room he had left Sam in. Dean was off on a separate hunt and wouldn't be back for another day. Sam had a stack of brochures in front of him, and they didn't look to be from the towns they visited. "What the hell are these?"

"Brochures," said Sam picking up on that read STANFORD. "I'm going to college, become a lawyer."

"The hell you are," said John grabbing the brochure from Sam's hand. "You're going to stay with me and Dean and hunt those bastards out there that killed your mother."

"This is your crusade, Dad. Not mine." Sam grabbed back his brochure and looked through it.

"This is our job!"

"It's not a job, Dad," said Sam and stood to face his father. "It's a vendetta, it's suicidal and I don't want to be a part of it. I want to be normal!"

"You think that's normal?" John pointed a finger out the window where the neon light of the motel flashed. "Those innocent people walking around without a care in the world, still believing that werewolves, vampires and demons are figments of an insane person's imagination? There's a reason why we call them innocents, Sammy. That's not normal, that's a dream!"

"Well, maybe I want to be a part of it! Did you ever think of that?"

John sighed in an attempt to hold his anger. He had known that Sam didn't really want to be a Hunter, ever since Sam was thirteen and had John vanquished a demon the town over. Before that Sam was perfectly happy in becoming a Hunter, learning how to use a gun and learn all the rituals to exorcise a demon from a victim. He had thought it was a game, but John had ingrained it in both boys that what they did wasn't a game. Something had changed in Sam when he was thirteen, early November, and John never knew what it was.

"Sam, you are a part of something," said John. "We fight evil. Isn't that enough?"

"I'll fight evil my own way, Dad," said Sam holding up the Stanford brochure. "I'm going to law school."

"What do you know about law?!" asked John as Sam gathered the brochures and held them tightly in his hand.

"Plenty," said Sam. "And I'll learn more once I get to Stanford."

Sam grabbed his coat and walked toward the door.

"Sam, if you walk out that door neither Dean nor I will help you when you wake up from that dream," said John. Sam stopped with his hand on the door and looked straight at his father.

"Then I hope I'll never wake up," said Sam and walked out the door.

John sighed heavily and sat on the bed. Scrubbing his hair he pulled out his wallet and took out one of the two pictures he had. One was of him Sam and Dean during their yearly family pictures. John was always adamant on keeping recent photographs in case one of them got lost or hurt. The other was of his wife, holding Sam just after he was born with Dean by her side, both smiling brightly at the camera.

"What do I do now, Mary? How do I get our son back?"

_**It doesn't matter what've you done, I still love you. It doesn't matter where you've been, you can still come home. And honey, if it's you we've got a lot of making up to do and I can't hug you on the phone so hurry home.**_

_**Well the message light was blinking when he got back it was an old friend calling 'cause he just heard the news. He said "I hope you find her, and if I see her I'll remind her that her dad is worried and he wants her to know…."**_

John wiped the sweat off his face as he left the house. The poltergeist he had been hunting was harder to track down then usual, but he finally manages to get it under control and destroyed it. He walked into his bedroom, tossed his car keys onto the table and went to take a bath.

It had been almost a month since Sam walked out to start a life of his own. A month of no word on how he was or if he missed his father and brother or if he was wrong and wanted to return to the nightmare as he called it. So far, no call.

Dean was not very happy when he got back and found Sam had left. He took his responsibility as a big brother very seriously and left immediately to try and drag Sam back, but Sam had already left. Last John heard form him he as in route with Sam's bus and would meet up with the youngest Winchester at Stanford. So far all Dean said was that he met up with Sam and was talking with him. That was two years ago. Now he and dean hardly speak to each other, just a phone call once a week to let them know they were each alive and get together for a hunt if needed. Dena still obeyed Johns orders but it was mechanical now. There was no drive behind it.

Walking out of the bathroom his phone beeped signaling he had a voice message. John didn't usually take his phone with him on a hunt, he found it too much of a distraction. Walking over to it he checked the voice mail and was surprised to find it from Bobby. He hadn't talked to Bobby in years. Pressing the button to listen to the voice mail he put the phone to his ear.

_ "Hey, John. I heard what happened to Sam. I'm sorry to hear about that. I'll be passin' by there soon and was wonderin' if you want me to drive by and check up on your boy. Just call me al'right?"_

John couldn't help but feel appreciative that Bobby would do that for him. But then, John knew it was mostly for Sam that he would go out of his way to contact John in the first place. Bobby may not care for John, but he did for Dean and Sam.

Pressing redial John held the phone to his ear as it rang.

_ "Hello?"_

"Bobby, its John."

_ "Well, the prodigal Hunter comeths. How's Dean?" _

"Looking for Sam. He worries too much about his brother. It's going to get him killed one day."

_ "That's just a sign of a good brother. I can talk to them if you like. Head up to that college of Sam's. What was it…..."_

"Stanford," said John.

_ "That's it. I could head up there and give him a good talkin' to."_

"Thanks, Bobby, but no thanks. He's gotta make his own mistakes."

_ "But you want him to come back."_

"Yeah, I do. But I don't want to force him to do something he doesn't want to."

_ "If you're sure….."_

"Yeah, I am. Thanks anyway, Bobby. Good hunting."

_ "Good huntin', John." _

John ended the call with a sigh and left the phone on the table. As much as he wanted to bring Sam back, he couldn't do it by force. Sam had to come on his own.

_**Well the days dragged by without a word from her and it looked like she might not be coming back. People say "Man, don't you think it might be time to take that old message off the machine." He said "No, you never knew when she'll call."**_

John walked into the roadhouse and smiled when Ellen greeted him.

"Hey, John, how's business?" she asked.

"Usual," he said. "Basic demon menace and ghostly activity. Nothing to make a fuss about."

"I hope so. I don't want my girl going out and getting into that sort of thing."

John smiled at her. "Then why do you have me around? It can't be my charm, can it?"

Ellen slapped him with the towel in her hand. "Now I know where Dean gets it. Oh, Jo." Jo looked toward her mother with a basket of laundry in her arms. "Freshen up a room for John, will you? He's just come back from a long trip."

"Sure, Mom," she said and smiled at John. "Hello, Mr. Winchester. How's Dean?"

"Dean's just fine, Jo. I'm afraid he's busy lately and can't visit."

Jo's face fell and she fiddled with the hem of a clean sheet.

"Go fix up John's room, Jo," said Ellen and Jo hurried out. "Sorry about that, John."

"It's all right. Love knows no bounds, as we both know," said John and took a sip of the drink Ellen placed in front of him.

"Well, I don't want my little girl to get messed up with that sort of thing. She's not going to go hunting and get killed like her daddy."

"Bill was one of the best Hunters I've known. I was lucky to have known him."

Ellen smiled gratefully at him as she cleaned a mug. "So, have you really heard from Dean? I tried calling you. Heard that message of yours. It's like you don't wanna answer your phone."

"I told you, I'm after something big. I can't get them involved yet."

Ellen looked at him in surprise. "Yet? You make them sound like soldiers in this private war of yours."

"This is a war, Ellen. Something big's coming. I would say a storm, but it's not. Something after the storm."

"After the storm? What's after a storm?"

John didn't answer as he looked into the honey color of his drink.

_**She was just outside a bar in New York City. Her so called friends had left her all alone. She was scared he wouldn't want her but she dialed that old number and let it ring and then she heard him sing.**_

"You okay, Sammy," asked Dean.

Sam looked up to tell him off on calling him the childish name, but shook his head against it. He didn't feel like arguing with his brother right then. He had just lost the normal life he had always wanted, his graduate from college, and the girl he had planned to spend the rest of his life with. Of course he wasn't okay!

"Sam?"

"I will be," said Sam as he sat on the second bed. Dean always took the one nearest the door. It was an unconscious instinct in both brothers.

"I'm going to get something to eat," said Dean, trying to lighten the mood. "Do you want anything, a hamburger, steak, pizza…?"

"Pizza's fine," said Sam looking at the opposite wall, his back to Dean. From the tone of Dean's voice Sam knew that his brother was afraid that Sam blamed him for what happened to Jessica, for possibly leading the demon to Sam and getting his brother's girlfriend killed, but Sam didn't blame Dean. As much as he wanted a normal life he secretly knew that his past was going to get back at him one day, no matter how hard he tried to hide from it.

Dean nodded. "All right. I'll pick up some ice cream on the way too. You still like the mint flavor stuff right?"

Sam softly chuckled. He grew out of liking mint ice cream when he was sixteen, but by then their father had Dean as a full time Hunter and it was mostly Sam and John riding together. He like rocky road now, but his brother was trying to be helpful and Sam just couldn't deny him his stupid attempts.

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I still like mint."

Dean nodded again and walked out the door. Reaching into his pocket Sam took out his phone, debating on whether he should call his father or not. Dean said that he couldn't reach their father, but for some reason Sam had to try. Probably the family loyalty that Dean's always spouting.

Without realizing what he was doing Sam dialed up John's phone number and placed the phone at his ear. After three rings he got the voice mail.

"_This is John and I can't come to the phone right now, so leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. And if you're my boys, I'm waiting for the day when we'll be together again."_

_**It doesn't matter what've you one, I still love you. It doesn't matter where you've been, you can still come home. And honey, if it's you we've got a lot of making up to do and I can't hug you on the phone so hurry home.**_

_**He walked in just in time to hear her say…. **_

John sighed as he walked through the door of the motel room he was staying at and set the car keys on the table. He had a rough day tracking a demon and getting information out of it but the demon stayed tight lipped till it burst in flames.

He was about to walk to the bathroom to wash the blood and dirt off him when his phone beeped, letting him know he had voice mail. Usually he waited till after he washed to listen but for some reason he walked over to his phone, picked it up and entered the code to listen to the mail. Putting the phone to his ear he laughed and smiled and cried when he heard a voice he hadn't heard for four years and almost thought would never hear again.

"_**Dad, I'm on my way."**_

**END**


End file.
